


ninety eight candles

by chaosy



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Birthdays, Fourth of July, M/M, tired grandpas in love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-12
Updated: 2016-07-12
Packaged: 2018-07-23 14:51:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,739
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7467546
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chaosy/pseuds/chaosy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“We’re not celebrating the fourth of July. It’s too hot to do anything, and Christopher Columbus was a murderer.”<br/>“Right,” Bucky says, and goes back to sleep.</p>
            </blockquote>





	ninety eight candles

**Author's Note:**

> quick and sleepy happy-birthday-steve fic, because I'm british and don't understand the fourth of july
> 
> chit chats welcome at roma-nov.tumblr.com
> 
> EDIT; have been made aware that christopher columbus has nothing to do with fourth of july. i really have nothing to say in my defense other than i'm kind of an idiot. sorry guys.

The first day of July is a good one. It’s a Saturday, and Bucky likes Saturdays. They usually entail sleeping in and Steve petting his fingers through his hair absently as he sketches.

This morning, Steve is already up, albeit still in pyjamas. He’s in the bedroom doorway looking at an envelope that must’ve come with the morning post. The first birthday cards are here.

“You wanna do anything nice for the Fourth?” Bucky asks him, sleepily, rolling onto his front in bed so he can get a good look at him. “Fireworks might be nice.”

Steve scoffs and shakes his head. “We’re not celebrating the fourth of July. It’s too hot to do anything, and Christopher Columbus was a murderer.”

“Right,” Bucky says, and goes back to sleep.

Of course he plans something, though, because he’s missed a lot of Steve’s birthdays.

They’re technically unemployed but someone still vets their mail and scans it for bombs or powders. There are at least two spies living in their building (not threats, but Bucky occasionally likes to stare at them to spook them) and Bucky’s weekly or daily (depends how he feels) sweep of the apartment usually reveals one or two bugs. 

They’ve moved five times in the last year.

So, it’s hard to get any privacy, is what he’s saying. And Steve is a pretty private person. Therein lies the problem.

Bucky has spent decades in the shadows, though. He is an _expert_  in privacy. Steve, bless his heart, still thinks _password1_ is the height of encryption.

He talks to Natasha on the second of July. She points him in the direction of an extraordinarily shady guy who rents Bucky a (surprisingly pleasant) Subaru. Natasha howls with laughter when she sees it and calls Bucky a _soccer mom_ , which he doesn’t understand, but she lets him store it in her garage.

“You sure you don’t want to do something on the Fourth? A certain someone is turning ninety eight,” he says to Steve that evening. He’s going for cute, but Bucky has been through a lot of torture and can comfortably lift a car. Cute is not an easy achievement.

Steve, cuteness or lack thereof, gives him a smile warmer than the oncoming heatwave. “We’re good. Just kind of - reminds me of a life that I don’t have anymore.”

“Maybe that’s not such a bad thing,” Bucky says, philosophically. “Just because we don’t have it anymore doesn’t mean it wasn’t there.”

“That - sort of makes sense,” Steve says, and holds out an arm for him as he cooks. “I get what you mean.” And Bucky gets an arm around his waist and a kiss to his temple.

Bucky breaks away to cut peppers. Neither of them are all that good at cooking, but they derive a weird pleasure from trying out new recipes and watching Sam’s horrified expression when they don’t season properly.

“Besides. Things ain’t so bad now,” Steve says, once they’re sat down and eating. “Microwaves are pretty useful.”

“Mhm. And civil rights,” Bucky adds. Steve smiles at him again. The stars grow brighter in the sky.

–

He has a bad day on the third of July. He wakes up choking on his own breath at three in the morning and locks himself in the bathroom.

Steve sits outside the door. Bucky sees his fingertips just poke through underneath the door and touches them with his own.

“I’m okay,” he says.

“I know you are, bud,” Steve’s voice comes through, slightly muffled.

Bucky sits it out for a little while longer, shaking, pressing his forehead against the wood. Steve starts talking to him after a few minutes about how weird kitchen utensils are these days. He’s halfway through explaining what a Magic Bullet is before Bucky opens the door and sinks into his arms.

Steve catches him. He’s good at that these days. They sit in the half-spill of light and Bucky hangs onto him, feet skidding a little on the wooden floor, feeling his hands smooth over his back.

“Got you,” Steve mumbles into his ear. Bucky nods, exhales slowly.

He can’t get back to sleep so they sit on the couch and watch old Westerns. Steve brings them both tea, because he’s a fucking grandmother, and Bucky wraps himself up in a blanket, because he’s also a fucking grandmother.

He crashes around seven that morning. Steve is slumped on his shoulder, snoring quietly.

The rest of the day is rough; they get a lot of phone calls and a stack of mail from agents, soldiers, friends and corporates who want to send Steve birthday cards. There’ll be more tomorrow. Bucky just wants the world to try and stop talking to them for a minute.

“Sorry,” he says to Steve, two in the afternoon, sitting in bed. Steve kisses his neck.

–

He’s better, the morning of the Fourth. Or at least, able to leave the apartment, which in Bucky’s book is pretty good. A courier from some government agency comes with literal crates of mail. Steve had once said _sure_  to some PR dude when asked if he wanted to receive fan mail. He used to respond to it personally back when he was Captain America in the war. He liked talking to strangers, telling them kind things through pen and ink.

#HappyBirthdayCap is trending worldwide.

Most of the packages people have sent to Steve have been confiscated by - _someone_  - to check for any kind of nefarious shit. Bucky doesn’t doubt that people will try and put a bullet through their window at some point. It’s happened before.

Well - it was him, but - still.

Steve looks at all the kids’ cards, first. He smiles when he reads the sloppy handwriting and delights over the simple, colourful pictures.

Bucky hooks his chin over his shoulder as he reads them. One little girl has drawn herself as Captain America, poorly-scrawled brown plaits and the shield in one stick hand. “You’ve got competition,” he says to Steve, who laughs and sinks back against him.

Bucky’s own card is pretty simple. He pressed some flowers because he’s a sap (”You’re a sap,” Steve says, when he sees it) and wrote _happy birthday, I love you_  inside. Steve still lights up brighter than the fucking fireworks, kisses him until Bucky’s stumbling and laughing in the kitchen. 

They put up their favourite cards (mostly from the five year-olds) up on the mantle, along with [Natasha’s](http://t.umblr.com/redirect?z=https%3A%2F%2Fc1.staticsfly.com%2Fasset%2Ffetch%2Fcs%2FSTATIONERYCARD_FOLDED_5x7-27102-6978-MERCHLARGE_FRONT%2Fthumbnail.preview%2Fv1&t=NzYyZDZiOTRlNTVlNDU3YjJlNWRjYTFlZTEwZGQ1ZmRiMjVmZTExNixzMjk2aTBDVw%3D%3D) and[Sam’s](http://t.umblr.com/redirect?z=https%3A%2F%2Fs-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com%2F564x%2F6d%2Fd5%2Fd2%2F6dd5d244e7805a62d444bc1468f98d76.jpg&t=YWVkY2NhZmYzYzdiMTIzZWMzYjY3ZTJiY2QwMWZlMTBlNmZhNjc2MCxzMjk2aTBDVw%3D%3D) ones. They save some more from the friends they have, and the rest is sent back with the courier. Steve will write a few responses they can send out en masse, and he’ll sign them. A few he writes personal, longer responses to, like the kids, or the few veterans who write in and thank him for his service.

Bucky remembers Steve’s sixteenth birthday where he didn’t get any cards at all. The future isn’t so bad, he thinks.

They take the day. They go out and have lunch at a bakery where they’re known and the staff are discreet. Steve tips an outrageous amount and Bucky mutters _inflation_  under his breath. Steve laughs and flicks a breadcrumb at him.

It’s hot - way too hot to think about heading to Coney Island, and the crowds are always so intense there that Bucky would balk at the idea anyway.

It’s alright, though. He’s planned.

When Steve sees the Subaru he starts laughing. “ _Soccer mom Barnes_ ,” he chokes out.

“What the hell does that _mean_ ,” Bucky says, hopelessly, but he unlocks the car and shoves Steve inside.

The drive takes about a long time. New York seems so much bigger than when they were young, and it felt bloated even during the Depression. But eventually they’re out of the city and heading across the Hudson, up and up, until Bucky pulls off onto a tiny little car park in the woods.

“This is nice,” Steve says. It is. The sun shines down through the leaves and creates dapples on his skin. Bucky kisses him a few times before he actually starts moving.

He scouted out the riverbank on the second. It’s grassy and quiet, faces the river. It’s almost evening by now, the sun blazing through the sky, the stars just blinking through.

He spreads a rug out, points Steve to sit on it, and digs around in his bag. There are some rolls from the bakery, a thermos of coffee, a small box containing a couple of cupcakes.

Bucky’s kind of a shithead, so one of them has the American flag on them.

“I want this one,” Steve says, taking the one with the flower on it. Bucky shoots him a look. “S’my birthday. I get to pick my own damn cake. Your plan has backfired,” Steve says.

“I will set you on fire,” Bucky warns him. Steve laughs. It’s a beautiful sound.

He does actually have a lighter, which he brandishes warningly at Steve before lighting a small candle which he sticks in the flowery cake. 

Steve looks at him expectantly and doesn’t blow it out. “C’mon,” Bucky says. “Don’t ask me to sing it.”

Steve, predictably, does. “Oh, no. It’s my birthday. And you’re so intent on being sweet today. You can sing to me,” he says, so utterly pleased with himself that Bucky, god help him, sings him happy birthday.

The candle is blown out in a haste, and Steve carefully sets it back in the box before leaning over and kissing him. “You’re the best,” he says. He kisses his nose, his chin. Bucky sinks into it like a drowning man taking his last breath. “I love you. Love you, Bucky.”

“Love you too, you old man,” Bucky says, weakly. He sprawls out with Steve on the blanket and they kiss, lazily, for a while. He very nearly squashes one of the cupcakes. Steve just laughs helplessly into his mouth.

The sky darkens as evening steals up on them. They share the cake, the rolls, the coffee, their lives.

They’re pretty alone out here - _private_ , at fucking last - but Bucky can hear the fireworks in the distance. He lays back with his head on Steve’s stomach, staring up at the trees. It’s the clatter of gunfire, dragging Steve to go see the fireworks when they were kids, the beat of his own heart.

“Remind you of anything?” Steve whispers. He feels it too.

Bucky nods and takes a hold of his hand.


End file.
